Recently, it was reported that the unemployment rate dropped to a low of below 6%. By the sound of it, a falling unemployment rate sounds like good news but it is not always an indication of good news.
The unemployment rate is the total number of people without a job and looking for work divided by the total labor force. If people find work, the unemployment rate goes down. However, if people just give up and stop looking for work, they are no longer part of the labor force and the unemployment rate goes down.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there are 93 million Americans not part of the labor force. Over the last few months, I was wondering why so many people just aren't working. So I decided to do a little research.
How many Americans are there? 319 million according to the US Census.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, our work force is 147 million Americans and the total number of Americans not in the labor force equals 93 million Americans.
Those two statistics added up total to 240 million Americans. The difference between 319 million and 240 million Americans is 79 million Americans. I would assume that most of these Americans would be children. Just to double check, I looked up the total number of children aged 0-17 years of age and came up with the figure of 75 million, so that is pretty close.
My next question is this. How many total jobs are in America. According to the department of numbers, the total is 147 million if you look at CPS or 139 million if you look at CES.
Well, that looks like a pretty easy conclusion to draw. If our total labor force is only 147 million and there are only 147 million jobs, there are 93 million people not working because there aren't enough jobs.
My next question is this. Of that 93 million people, how many aren't working because they are retired?
According to the social security website, there are 64 million Americans collecting either social security, supplemental income, or both. This does not guarantee that they are not working but this next calculation is more of an estimate than the ones above.
Assuming that 64 million Americans are retired and not working, 93 million Americans minus 64 million (assumed) retired Americans leaves 29 million Americans not retired, not children, and not looking for work.
This 29 million I calculated only counts the people not part of the labor force. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the actual number of unemployed Americans equal 18 million. Both these figures added together equal 47 million. Almost 15% of the total US population.
Saturday, October 11, 2014
Monday, September 29, 2014
One Crazy way to Increase Fuel Efficiency
A couple of years back, my buddy owned a Honda Accord. These cars are great. Fuel efficient, cheap insurance premiums, and they last forever. This is the kind of car a responsible man wants to own.
What my friend did next was something really admirable.
In pursuit of getting better gas mileage, he started stripping his car of dead weight. His tool of choice. Hatchet, if I remember correctly.
Over the next couple of weeks, I started seeing parts of his car disappearing. Back seats. Gone. Glove compartment. Gone. Cup holders. Gone.
He removed all the bottom carpet and padding. Using a hatchet, he tore all the plastic off the doors. Anything that made the interior look nice, he got rid of until the interior looked just like the inside of an aluminium can.
I've never done or tried this myself, but I would estimate the weight he removed from his car by at least 50 to 100 pounds. I don't really know how much gas he was able to save each week, but I'm sure he was able to notice a difference.
Obviously, this isn't a solution for everyone. Only consider trying this if you drive a beater that you don't intend to resell. You don't want to do this to a luxury car. This will also be inconvenient if you frequently drive passengers. And of course, if this seems like too much of a dumb idea to try, the easy solution is to just trade in the car for a motorcycle.
However, if you are a minimalist or really frugal and you enjoy making modifications; go ahead and try striping your car. Just don't be dumb about it. Don't remove things that will make your car unsafe to drive like any mirrors, the airbags, seat belts, or different bolts and bars underneath your car. Don't make your car unsafe or illegal to drive. Don't endanger your life or someone else to get better gas mileage. Also realize that some weight adds value to your car such as spare tires, tools to fix your car, and other emergency supplies.
Sunday, September 28, 2014
Lets all go to space
As a little kid, I was pretty big into action cartoons. Each day when I got home, I'd drop off my backpack and turn the tv on to see some DragonBall Z, Gundam Wing, or whatever else was on toonami. In between shows, toonami would air these motivational speeches/montages. I've linked to them below.
Space is the Place
Dreams
To hell with fear
These bumps were were there just to fill up some extra time and build up hype for the shows but I saw these on almost a daily basis. Broken Promise (dreams) aired when I was 13 but the message stuck for a long time.
Choose the path you want to walk in life. Realize there will be multiple obstacles that will get in your way. Do everything you can to keep moving forward. Keep making progress.
I'd find myself watching the video up on youtube during my early 20s. Nothing in life is ever guaranteed, but you have to do the best you can and see what you can accomplish.
Space is the Place is the montage I was thinking about in the last few weeks at work. The whole idea of blasting off into space and leaving everything else behind kind of feels what it is like when you decide to go your own way and free yourself of whatever is chaining you down.
Whether it is an oppressive government, copious amounts of debt, a miserable job, a toxic relationship, or mind numbing pop culture; escaping that nonsense feels just like blasting off into space. Out in space, you are free to pursue your own interests further or seek new hobbies.
While there is some comfort to be found in materialism, empty relationships, and internet trivia; these are things that will keep a man from freedom.
Free yourself of what is holding you back and blast off into space. Choose your freedom and go and explore what is out there. While it may not be as grand as orbiting Mars, the world is a very interesting place. Sitting at a computer, you can look up tutorials on how to repair cars, edit videos, publish books, play a guitar, cook chickens, and everything else.
Space is the Place
Dreams
To hell with fear
These bumps were were there just to fill up some extra time and build up hype for the shows but I saw these on almost a daily basis. Broken Promise (dreams) aired when I was 13 but the message stuck for a long time.
Choose the path you want to walk in life. Realize there will be multiple obstacles that will get in your way. Do everything you can to keep moving forward. Keep making progress.
I'd find myself watching the video up on youtube during my early 20s. Nothing in life is ever guaranteed, but you have to do the best you can and see what you can accomplish.
Space is the Place is the montage I was thinking about in the last few weeks at work. The whole idea of blasting off into space and leaving everything else behind kind of feels what it is like when you decide to go your own way and free yourself of whatever is chaining you down.
Whether it is an oppressive government, copious amounts of debt, a miserable job, a toxic relationship, or mind numbing pop culture; escaping that nonsense feels just like blasting off into space. Out in space, you are free to pursue your own interests further or seek new hobbies.
While there is some comfort to be found in materialism, empty relationships, and internet trivia; these are things that will keep a man from freedom.
Free yourself of what is holding you back and blast off into space. Choose your freedom and go and explore what is out there. While it may not be as grand as orbiting Mars, the world is a very interesting place. Sitting at a computer, you can look up tutorials on how to repair cars, edit videos, publish books, play a guitar, cook chickens, and everything else.
Saturday, September 27, 2014
Lifetime Strategy
The most valuable thing in my life is my freedom. My time. Well, that is the second most important thing. My life and my health is the most important thing.
Life and health is never guaranteed though. Nothing is ever guaranteed, except for death.
When we die is not known. We can expect to die of natural causes and perish around the age of 70, 80, or 90. I could get cancer or some other life threatening disease and perish at the age of 40 or 50. In the worst case, I could get killed in a car accident tomorrow. This is the reality that we all face.
With that being said, I want to make sure I can enjoy my life to the fullest extent possible. How does a person do this? Pursue that which makes you happy. What makes you happy? That is different for everyone. If you don't know what it is that makes you happy in life, then at least try to avoid the stuff in your life that makes you miserable.
To me, that which makes me miserable is working. The kind of hell of commuting to an office each morning, working a minimum of 8 hours, commuting back home, and enjoying only a few hours to myself each night is what I want to avoid. It is my goal to try to get through life working as little as possible.
There are a couple of ways to do this. First off, pursue a life of minimalist spending. Don't take or commit to any obligations or liabilities that drag out decades into the future or indefinitely. By adopting minimalist spending habits, you eliminate or mitigate the risk of being unable to pay for the liabilities in the future. If you don't need the money to pay off the liability, you don't need to work for it. By keeping annual expenses down as low as possible, you also minimize the amount of pain you experience when inflation hits.
The second way to reduce your need to work is to accumulate a large amount of capital when you are young. Instead of racking up large amounts of student and consumer debt as a kid, work as much as you possibly can and accumulate a large amount of cash. If you do decide to go to college, make sure to pursue something with a high earnings potential such as STEM. Pay off all your debts then accumulate capital.
By getting into a good financial position in the late 20s or early 30s, you make the rest of your life that much easier. Instead of having to repay consumer debt, maybe you can cut back on your hours and enjoy much more leisure.
Life and health is never guaranteed though. Nothing is ever guaranteed, except for death.
When we die is not known. We can expect to die of natural causes and perish around the age of 70, 80, or 90. I could get cancer or some other life threatening disease and perish at the age of 40 or 50. In the worst case, I could get killed in a car accident tomorrow. This is the reality that we all face.
With that being said, I want to make sure I can enjoy my life to the fullest extent possible. How does a person do this? Pursue that which makes you happy. What makes you happy? That is different for everyone. If you don't know what it is that makes you happy in life, then at least try to avoid the stuff in your life that makes you miserable.
To me, that which makes me miserable is working. The kind of hell of commuting to an office each morning, working a minimum of 8 hours, commuting back home, and enjoying only a few hours to myself each night is what I want to avoid. It is my goal to try to get through life working as little as possible.
There are a couple of ways to do this. First off, pursue a life of minimalist spending. Don't take or commit to any obligations or liabilities that drag out decades into the future or indefinitely. By adopting minimalist spending habits, you eliminate or mitigate the risk of being unable to pay for the liabilities in the future. If you don't need the money to pay off the liability, you don't need to work for it. By keeping annual expenses down as low as possible, you also minimize the amount of pain you experience when inflation hits.
The second way to reduce your need to work is to accumulate a large amount of capital when you are young. Instead of racking up large amounts of student and consumer debt as a kid, work as much as you possibly can and accumulate a large amount of cash. If you do decide to go to college, make sure to pursue something with a high earnings potential such as STEM. Pay off all your debts then accumulate capital.
By getting into a good financial position in the late 20s or early 30s, you make the rest of your life that much easier. Instead of having to repay consumer debt, maybe you can cut back on your hours and enjoy much more leisure.
Tuesday, September 23, 2014
Scouting Techniques for College Students
One of the most important lessons any man will learn in life is how important scouting is. Whenever you have the chance to learn about a situation before hand, do it. You don't want to jump into something completely blind.
Most kids will graduate high school at the age of 18 then jump into college the very next semester. One of the biggest differences a kid is going to notice between high school and college is that in college, you get to choose your field of study, your classes, and your schedule.
First thing first, don't major in something stupid. What is a stupid major? Go buy Worthless by Aaron Clarey.
After you make sure you major in some sort of STEM degree, realize that your degree will require you to take a lot of classes that are a complete waste of time and money. You will take at least 2 years of core classes which must be taken before you can actually pursue your field of study.
With that being said, you still need to take these worthless classes and do well in them. You need to do this to maintain a good GPA which has some affect on your employment prospects after graduating but it plays a more immediate effect on merit based scholarships.
Some of these classes are unavoidable. I'm sure every single major requires 2 English classes and most majors require some sort of foreign language class. Two history classes are required. If I recall correctly, I think that psychology is unavoidable and you have to take at least one philosophy class.
Some of these classes, you will have a choice to take. In my college days, I had to take 3 classes that were a 3000 level class outside of my field of study.
These classes will have nothing to do with your major. So to make your experience as painless as possible, go ahead and follow the path of least resistance. Choose the easy classes that you can do well in and boost your GPA. Just make sure that those credits count towards your degree.
Before signing up for your classes, you get to see the time slot and the professor that teaches the class. This is where the scouting comes in. Make sure to gather intel on your prospective teacher by looking them up on www.ratemyprofessors.com. If you are about to go to college or are in college and don't know about ratemyprofessor, bookmark this link now.
Rate my professor has been around since I was in high school. It has saved me on a few occasions. Most of the teachers you look up will be average. If you have the option to take a professor that is highly rated, you may want to sign up for those. Higher ratings tend to correlate with easier classes.
The biggest reason you want to use ratemyprofessors is to scan for professors that are absolutely insane. The difficulty of the exact same history class can vary drastically depending on who teaches it. If you find a professor with 20 ratings all rating the professor 1 or 2, make sure to avoid that professor. You don't need to make life harder than it already is.
I experienced this when I was about to sign up for an accounting class years back. I had the option to take it in the Summer but only one professor taught it in the summer. I saw 20 ratings off students just dumping all over her.
She was described as senile, retarded, argumentative, and contradictory. The comment that just absolutely broke it for me was that a student claimed this professor stated that debits went on the right and credits go on the left.
After reading all that, I decided to put that class off until the Fall where I could take a better professor.
You want to avoid getting an awful professor for a few important reasons. When I was in college, you were only allowed to withdraw from a class 6 times. If you withdrew from a class after 6 times, you would get an F for the class and that would tank your GPA.
The other real important reason you want to avoid withdrawing from a horrible class is time. If you drop a class, that is time that is being wasted. You have to get those credits sooner or later. In the case of a withdraw, you have to take those classes later.
The other scouting technique I want to briefly mention is getting the syllabus. Go to classes on the first day and make sure to get a copy of it. Unlike high school, in college, every graded item will show up on the syllabus. The point values for every item is listed and the schedule for every graded item is listed. Using the syllabus will let you track your current progress in the class and give you an idea of how much effort you have to put in to get a certain grade.
If you found this information helpful, please visit Academic Composition.
Most kids will graduate high school at the age of 18 then jump into college the very next semester. One of the biggest differences a kid is going to notice between high school and college is that in college, you get to choose your field of study, your classes, and your schedule.
First thing first, don't major in something stupid. What is a stupid major? Go buy Worthless by Aaron Clarey.
After you make sure you major in some sort of STEM degree, realize that your degree will require you to take a lot of classes that are a complete waste of time and money. You will take at least 2 years of core classes which must be taken before you can actually pursue your field of study.
With that being said, you still need to take these worthless classes and do well in them. You need to do this to maintain a good GPA which has some affect on your employment prospects after graduating but it plays a more immediate effect on merit based scholarships.
Some of these classes are unavoidable. I'm sure every single major requires 2 English classes and most majors require some sort of foreign language class. Two history classes are required. If I recall correctly, I think that psychology is unavoidable and you have to take at least one philosophy class.
Some of these classes, you will have a choice to take. In my college days, I had to take 3 classes that were a 3000 level class outside of my field of study.
These classes will have nothing to do with your major. So to make your experience as painless as possible, go ahead and follow the path of least resistance. Choose the easy classes that you can do well in and boost your GPA. Just make sure that those credits count towards your degree.
Before signing up for your classes, you get to see the time slot and the professor that teaches the class. This is where the scouting comes in. Make sure to gather intel on your prospective teacher by looking them up on www.ratemyprofessors.com. If you are about to go to college or are in college and don't know about ratemyprofessor, bookmark this link now.
Rate my professor has been around since I was in high school. It has saved me on a few occasions. Most of the teachers you look up will be average. If you have the option to take a professor that is highly rated, you may want to sign up for those. Higher ratings tend to correlate with easier classes.
The biggest reason you want to use ratemyprofessors is to scan for professors that are absolutely insane. The difficulty of the exact same history class can vary drastically depending on who teaches it. If you find a professor with 20 ratings all rating the professor 1 or 2, make sure to avoid that professor. You don't need to make life harder than it already is.
I experienced this when I was about to sign up for an accounting class years back. I had the option to take it in the Summer but only one professor taught it in the summer. I saw 20 ratings off students just dumping all over her.
She was described as senile, retarded, argumentative, and contradictory. The comment that just absolutely broke it for me was that a student claimed this professor stated that debits went on the right and credits go on the left.
After reading all that, I decided to put that class off until the Fall where I could take a better professor.
You want to avoid getting an awful professor for a few important reasons. When I was in college, you were only allowed to withdraw from a class 6 times. If you withdrew from a class after 6 times, you would get an F for the class and that would tank your GPA.
The other real important reason you want to avoid withdrawing from a horrible class is time. If you drop a class, that is time that is being wasted. You have to get those credits sooner or later. In the case of a withdraw, you have to take those classes later.
The other scouting technique I want to briefly mention is getting the syllabus. Go to classes on the first day and make sure to get a copy of it. Unlike high school, in college, every graded item will show up on the syllabus. The point values for every item is listed and the schedule for every graded item is listed. Using the syllabus will let you track your current progress in the class and give you an idea of how much effort you have to put in to get a certain grade.
If you found this information helpful, please visit Academic Composition.
Monday, September 22, 2014
Five Minute Job Salary Research
If you find this information useful, please visit www.academiccomposition.com.
Before deciding to commit to a college education, you have to have a general idea of what career path you want to pursue after college and if your major will lead you to that career path.
As the good captain said, you have to research starting salaries of the jobs you want to pursue.
10 years ago, this would have required an amount of effort. Today, you can just Google that information.
Take five minutes of your time and go to payscale and just type in different job titles into the search box.
Payscale.com will give you the job title, job descriptions, the national average salary and a range of salaries to expect. Some job titles will be exactly what you expect them to be. A barista average salary is $8.69 an hour without much of a range. Other job titles might be kind of vague and the range might be kind of wide. The average salary for a Business Consultant is $67,000 but the range goes from $44k to $110k. The idea of doing research for job salaries is to get a general idea of what jobs you might want to pursue.
There is one caveat I would like to mention about payscale. When you search for a specific job title, you get the national average of mostly everyone with that particular job title. Most of the people in the field will have multiple of years of experience and were hired before the economic downturn of 2008 and the health care reform act. With that being said, it might not be easy or realistic to earn the national average salary as soon as you graduate from college. It may take a couple of years of work to earn the average annual salary.
Take some time to research job salaries. It makes lifetime planning much easier.
Before deciding to commit to a college education, you have to have a general idea of what career path you want to pursue after college and if your major will lead you to that career path.
As the good captain said, you have to research starting salaries of the jobs you want to pursue.
10 years ago, this would have required an amount of effort. Today, you can just Google that information.
Take five minutes of your time and go to payscale and just type in different job titles into the search box.
Payscale.com will give you the job title, job descriptions, the national average salary and a range of salaries to expect. Some job titles will be exactly what you expect them to be. A barista average salary is $8.69 an hour without much of a range. Other job titles might be kind of vague and the range might be kind of wide. The average salary for a Business Consultant is $67,000 but the range goes from $44k to $110k. The idea of doing research for job salaries is to get a general idea of what jobs you might want to pursue.
There is one caveat I would like to mention about payscale. When you search for a specific job title, you get the national average of mostly everyone with that particular job title. Most of the people in the field will have multiple of years of experience and were hired before the economic downturn of 2008 and the health care reform act. With that being said, it might not be easy or realistic to earn the national average salary as soon as you graduate from college. It may take a couple of years of work to earn the average annual salary.
Take some time to research job salaries. It makes lifetime planning much easier.
Thursday, September 18, 2014
Excellent College Papers
When I was still in college, I took a number of classes which were not related to my field of study. Only 20% of the classes I took were my field of study. A number of my classes were related to my business field and then a good chunk of classes were completely unrelated to my field of study.
Luckily, most of my non accounting classes did not require the writing of essays. Usually, I just had to read the book, attend the lectures, and take a multiple choice test.
However, college papers were inevitable.
English 1
English 2
World History
Sociology
Political Science
These classes are pretty much unavoidable in any college major. If I remember correctly, I had to write a total of 14 to 15 essays for these classes total. All this just to become an accountant.
With each essay taking up an estimated 4 to 6 hours each, it took me 56 to 90 hours to complete this nonsense.
Back in my college years, I wish I would have known about Academic Composition.
Alex at Academic Composition will write your papers for you at a good price. Alex is a professional writer with 10 years of experience and has written over 1000 essays.
Each paper is original so you don't have to worry about being caught for plagiarism.
Take it from my experience, life just forces you to jump through hoops every now and again. Go ahead and visit Alex here at Academic Composition if you are interested.
Luckily, most of my non accounting classes did not require the writing of essays. Usually, I just had to read the book, attend the lectures, and take a multiple choice test.
However, college papers were inevitable.
English 1
English 2
World History
Sociology
Political Science
These classes are pretty much unavoidable in any college major. If I remember correctly, I had to write a total of 14 to 15 essays for these classes total. All this just to become an accountant.
With each essay taking up an estimated 4 to 6 hours each, it took me 56 to 90 hours to complete this nonsense.
Back in my college years, I wish I would have known about Academic Composition.
Alex at Academic Composition will write your papers for you at a good price. Alex is a professional writer with 10 years of experience and has written over 1000 essays.
Each paper is original so you don't have to worry about being caught for plagiarism.
Take it from my experience, life just forces you to jump through hoops every now and again. Go ahead and visit Alex here at Academic Composition if you are interested.
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